Sayreville DECA’s 2020-21 Chapter Sets All-Time Record at SCDC

On March 3, 2021, Sayreville’s DECA (Distributive Education Clubs of America) Chapter participated at the State Career Development Conference, where record-breaking results took place.

Before getting into the finalists and winners, it’s important to know that DECA is a non-profit and technical organization that prepares young high school and college students who aspire to be business leaders and entrepreneurs. With competitive events ranging from entrepreneurship, business management and administration, finance, hospitality and tourism, marketing, and personal financial literacy to choose from, students get to compete with other students in their region, state, or internationally through roleplays or written events.

In regards to Sayreville’s very own DECA Chapter, it is considered fairly small compared to other regions. The 100+ Sayreville DECA members are guided and led by advisor Mrs. Ferreri, Presidents Michelle Lee, Karanveer Panesar, Yash Kaple, and Neha Bhat, and twenty-one other board members. With this still fairly new, growing, and almost unknown chapter at Sayreville War Memorial High School, the state’s competitors felt uneasy at the awards ceremony.

However, from the results that were delivered, many competitors’ efforts paid off. To kick off the awards ceremony, Wade Guerra, Gargi Gupta, and Parth Patel received mini awards for their roleplay events, which recognized them as members with the highest testing or roleplay score.

The manual, which is a written competitive event, is where SWMHS DECA saw the most success. The Hospitality and Tourism Operations Research Team (Asha Amin and Mahi Patel) and the Sports Entertainment Operations Research Team (Moe Akinrefon, Phillip Pazdur, and Wade Guerra) placed top ten in their event.

The Community Awareness Project Team (Lasya Bhattiprolu and Neha Bhat) placed fifth, the Sales Project Event Team (Diya Shah, Mansha Katyal, and Natalie Paredes) placed second, the Start-Up Business Plan Event Team (Masharib Imran, Aayush Mehta, and Aaryan Parikh) placed first, and the Community Service Giving Project Event Team (Michelle Lee, Karanveer Panesar, and Doris Lee) placed first.

These achievements created a name for Sayreville’s DECA Chapter not only within the school but also throughout the state of New Jersey. And as the International Career Development Conference is nearing, the teams that finalized at the State Career Development Conference are thrilled and determined to compete.